


Love Left

by lizardwriter



Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-06
Updated: 2015-08-06
Packaged: 2018-04-13 07:05:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4512483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lizardwriter/pseuds/lizardwriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My take on why Laura couldn't say "I love you" back to Carmilla. Little Laura backstory.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Left

Little Laura waking up in the middle of the night to hear her parents fighting again. She can hear the tiredness in her dad’s voice, the pleading. She can hear the bitterness in her mother’s voice, the stress. She closes her eyes tightly and hums the song her dad sings her to put her to sleep after he gets home late from work (again).

.

Little Laura sitting at the table, staring at her food, appetite vanished as her mother glares across the table at her father, whose posture screams defeat. The air is tense and heavy. The meal’s soundtrack is the clatter of a dropped knife, heavy sighs, and the clink of silverware on plates.

.

Little Laura padding down the hall to get a glass of water and finding her mother standing looking out the door in her nightgown. Freezing air whips around her and makes Laura shiver, and Laura sees her mother’s body shake. She closes the door and takes her mother’s hand, cold as ice, and leads her into the living room. She cuddles into her on the couch until her mother wraps an arm around her. “I love you, little bug,” whispered in her ear.

.

Little Laura lingering in the hallway, listened to hushed words and tears behind a closed door.

“She needs you. I need you!”

“I need me, too, and I can’t have that here!”

“Please, stay! I love you!”

“Love’s not always enough!”

.

Little Laura left standing at the door with a hurried kiss on a damp cheek from a mother with red-rimmed eyes.

“I’ll always love you, little bug.”

Words murmured that linger in the air with the faintest hint of her mother’s perfume.

.

Little Laura crying on her father’s chest, being held tight. He doesn’t work late anymore. His eyes are sad, but his arms are warm and protective around her.

“It’s okay,” mumbled in a deep voice into her hair, felt as well as heard rumbling in his chest.

.

Little Laura waiting eagerly for a phone call on her birthday and a card at Christmas. Neither ever comes.

.

Laura alone in her bedroom at night, year after year, staring at the ceiling, wondering how someone can possibly leave you if they really, truly love you.

 


End file.
